


The King and the Marsh-wiggle

by surexit



Category: Chronicles of Narnia - C. S. Lewis
Genre: Mind Control, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-17
Updated: 2013-04-17
Packaged: 2017-12-08 18:33:57
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 822
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/764661
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/surexit/pseuds/surexit
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>King Rilian ruled Narnia well in those first months after his father died, ably assisted by many excellent advisors, but the King himself was still troubled by memories of his enchantment.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The King and the Marsh-wiggle

King Rilian ruled Narnia well in those first months after his father died, ably assisted by many excellent advisors, but the King himself was still troubled by memories of his enchantment. Now that the Witch was dead, he remembered every weary strangled day of those ten years, and everything he had done when his mind was not his own, and he woke gasping almost every night, as though being suffocated.

Now I don’t have to tell you what a dreadful effect this sort of thing can have, and it was evident that the prince was not well – so evident, in fact, that when Puddleglum came for his first visit from the marshes, the first thing he said was, “You look well, your Majesty,” with a grisly approximation of cheer.

This made the King laugh, the first laugh his court had heard for days, as he said, “Valiant Marsh-wiggle, your words discomfit me, I must admit. Do I look so haunted as all that?”

“Oh no,” Puddleglum said. “Only it did cross my mind that you might be dying. Poisoned, most likely, or struck down with a wasting disease.” Puddleglum had some reason to say these things, for if you had seen him you would have thought King Rilian a man of fifty, he was so hollow-cheeked and dark-eyed.

“Neither of these things,” King Rilian said, and said no more at that time, for they were being watched by many courtiers and another unfortunate consequence of the King’s long years of bondage was that he felt that he could trust no one. The wicked Witch had made him so afraid to believe what his own senses told him that even his dear friends among the courtiers did not know why he looked so ill.

Of course, Puddleglum already knew almost the whole story, and so the King found that that evening, as they were having an informal dinner in his quarters (something he’d been looking forward to, for he very much liked the Marsh-wiggle and his bravery and his good sense, and he found his habit of looking for the worst in things almost comforting) he gathered the trust enough to say, staring down at his food, “I find myself… entrapped by dreams.”

“Sorcery, I shouldn’t wonder,” Puddleglum said, almost cheerfully.

“I think not, friend Puddleglum, for remember that I have felt the vile snare of sorcery before.”

“There’s lots of different kinds of sorcery in the world,” Puddleglum said, but he said it as another person might have said, “Oh no, of course, you’re right,” and this evidence that Puddleglum was listening emboldened the King to continue.

“Do have some more pavender,” he said first, before he went on, and Puddleglum accepted. Then the King said, “In my sleep methinks that I am still under that spell, but this time I have not even been granted the mercy of forgetfulness. And my body does things and my mouth says things that I have not told them to do, and all the while my mind screams, trapped behind my eyes.”

Puddleglum finished off his pavender, for Marsh-wiggles are a serious people and never waste food. The King was somewhat glad of the few moments’ silence. He had never said anything of this nature out loud to anyone before, and he needed the time to catch his breath.

“Well,” Puddleglum said finally, thoughtfully setting down his fork. “These things do linger, they say.”

Rilian’s relief was great. You should know this about the King, that he had feared the accusation of madness so much that in his most terrified waking moments he had contemplated how they would lock him up and throw away the key if he ever breathed a word of his thoughts, and so Puddleglum’s stolid response came to him as a moment of pure relaxation. He laughed, again, the second time that Puddleglum had managed to provoke that miracle in less than a day, and said, “Do they, honest wiggle? Who are they?”

“Oh, the other Marsh-wiggles,” Puddleglum said. “You hear it often – a young wiggle will fall off his boat and almost drown, and the olders will say, ‘Oh, he’ll dream of water for weeks.’ It’s the sign of an unhealthy mind, I shouldn’t wonder, but it’s the kind of unhealthy mind many chaps have.”

“And do they have a solution, these older wiggles?” 

Now, I must tell you something a little extraordinary, for at these words there rose in Puddleglum’s muddy cheeks something like a blush, so that he went a little darker, almost glowing green, as he said, “They say companionship at night helps. Disturbs the dreams, you know.” He coughed, and no wonder, for the King’s eyebrows were raised high. “Of course, that’s for wiggles, I’m sure men are diff-”

“I don’t think we are so different,” the King said softly, and here we will leave them, for some things are private for both men and wiggles.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Podfic] The King and the Marsh-wiggle](https://archiveofourown.org/works/767094) by [sophia_sol](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sophia_sol/pseuds/sophia_sol)




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